


Romantic Rendezvous

by mika



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Fanatical Fics's Halloween Competition 2020, Ghosts, Podcast: Fanatical Fics and Where to Find Them, brought to you by a couple bottles of wine, excessive adverbs, gratuitous outfit description, ridiculous pairings galore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 06:20:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27319873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mika/pseuds/mika
Summary: Neville has a hot date planned for after the Halloween feast.(written with Jess for the Fanatical Fics Halloween Writing Competition 2020)
Relationships: Ariana Dumbledore/Neville Longbottom
Kudos: 1
Collections: Fanatical Fics Halloween Writing Competition 2020





	Romantic Rendezvous

Six p.m. on October 31st found Professor Neville Longbottom in his office getting ready for the annual Hogwarts Halloween feast. As he spritzed on cologne, he reflected on the fact that he didn’t usually put so much effort into his appearance for a school function. He laughed at himself, but continued fixing his appearance, smoothing his hair down and straightening his collar. His excitement lay not in the feast, but in his romantic rendezvous afterwards. After all, it was their one year anniversary, and he only had one chance to say “I love you” exactly right. With one last look in the mirror, Neville checked his watch, and left for the feast.

~passage of time~

As Neville sat in his chair at the top of the great hall, his thoughts continued to stray to his plan for the rest of the evening. He couldn’t remember the last time he had felt the way he did now… shaky with excitement… or was it nerves? He shook his head as if to clear the thoughts away and tried to turn his focus to the awkwardly cordial conversation Headmistress McGonagall and Professor Trelawney were having next to him.

~passage of time~

Neville again checked his watch as he made his way down to the greenhouses. After dinner had finished, the professors had all lingered in the great hall for a nightcap. He made his exit as soon as possible, but still feared he was running late. He hurriedly entered greenhouse two, where many of his pet projects were housed. This new plant, which he had been meticulously cultivating for the last 11 months, was the most central part of his plan for the night. He severed the stem with a swift “diffindo!”, picked up the pumpkin, and hurried back up to the castle. As Neville power-walked through the now empty halls of Hogwarts, he couldn’t stop his thoughts from drifting to this very night, one year previously.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Neville was walking despondently back to his office after the Halloween feast. While he was pleased at how his and Hagrid’s collaboration on their giant pumpkins turned out, he was feeling especially lonely that night.

He had been invited to a late-night party at the Hog’s Head, but he wasn’t planning on attending. All of his classmates had paired off, and he didn’t want to be the only single wizard at the party. It seemed as though he was getting wedding invitation patronuses every other week—Ron and Hermione, Draco and Harry, Luna and Gilderoy Lockhart, Dean and Seamus, Oliver and Percy, Pansy and Ernie, and, most oddly, Fenrir Greyback and Lavender Brown’s ghost. Supposedly he had regretted killing her and they had gotten together shortly after the Battle of Hogwarts.

He didn’t notice that he had been pacing back and forth in the corridor until a door suddenly appeared to his right. With a jolt of surprise, he realized he was outside the Room of Requirement. He hadn’t been inside the room since his seventh year, and remembered Harry telling him that it had been destroyed. While the door did appear to still have some scorch marks around the edges, it looked solid and whole, and he tentatively pushed it open.

He was shocked to find a sunny greenhouse, totally at odds with the chilly night he knew was actually occurring outside. Gazing from side to side, he saw some of the rarest plants— Horntail Lilies, Flipendo Flowers, and Soulsucking Brambles—and some vines and flowers that he didn’t even recognize. Neville could have spent hours exploring all of the magical herbs and fungi, had it not been for the blonde woman he saw at the end of the row of Flittering Ferns. He couldn’t see her face, as she was facing away from him, gently pouring from a watering can over the Dirigible Plums.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As Neville cautiously opened the door to the Room of Requirement, the most stunning sight yet met his eyes. The room was filled by a twilit meadow that seemed to go on forever, though if one looked hard enough, they could see a wall on the other side. Spread beneath the twinkling constellations was a picnic, with a basket filled to the brim with some of Neville's favorite foods.

Even more stunning than the setting was the woman standing in front of him.

“H-happy anniversary,” Neville stuttered as he held out a chocolate frog. She smiled and took the candy from him. Neville watched as she walked towards the picnic basket, unable to tug his gaze away. Her beauty was otherworldly, only accentuated by her low-cut floral halter skater minidress. As usual, she wore her favorite red Chuck Taylors, which matched the red streaks in her hair. Neville slowly followed her across the room and took a seat on the picnic blanket, as she turned her stormy grey eyes upon him.

“I’ve been looking forward to tonight,” she began, and was cut off by Neville’s profuse apologies for being late.

“Stop apologizing,” she said, putting her finger to his lips. “We don’t have much time before we have to leave.”

“You’re right… I mean, you’re always right. You’re so great… you know that, right? I mean, this past year, I’ve been the happiest I’ve ever been, and I think about you whenever we’re not together, and-”

“Neville,” she interrupted, breaking up his babbling.

“Sorry,” Neville apologized. He took a deep breath. “I grew this for you. I-I...” he paused, unable to get the words out. “I hope you like it.”

From a curiously small bag, he produced a larger-than-life pumpkin. Hermione’s skills at undetectable extension charms had only grown since she was 18, and where else was a guy supposed to hide a disproportionately large gourd? His pants?

In front of her eyes, the pumpkin slowly began to carve itself, forming the words “I love you” in a beautiful script. She smiled, and looked up at him.

“I love you too, Neville.”

He smiled with relief, and leaned in to kiss her, bringing his hand up to caress her cheek. Instead of stroking her face, his fingers met only icy cold air. He opened his eyes to see his hand pass through the space where her head should have been.

Ariana Dumbledore’s ghost smiled sadly, saying, “We can’t touch, remember?”

Neville sighed. “I would give anything…”

“It doesn’t change the way I feel about you,” she said firmly.

Although Ariana had only been 14 when she died, she was now clearly in her mid-twenties. A little-known Hogwarts convention dictated that, when a ghost fell in love, their age would change to that of their beloved. Rumor had it that this worked in either direction, aging the ghost up or down as much as necessary.

“I love the pumpkin. And I love you. This is going to be great… just relax," she assured him.

“You are… amazing,” Neville said fervently, nodding his head.

“Ready to go?” Ariana asked. Neville nodded again, and they both clambered through the portrait hole leading to the Hog’s Head. He was thrilled to finally introduce his mysterious lover to his friends, who had thought him single for so long.

“Is it true that Harry dumped Ginny through owl post?” her voice echoed as they walked through the passageway.

~passage of time~

Around 3 a.m., Neville walked contentedly back to his office, tipsily humming a little tune to himself. He didn’t even bat an eye as he passed the ghosts of a teenage Nearly-Headless Nick and Colin Creevey, floating and furiously making out against the ceiling, an unfortunately common but unavoidable Hogwarts sight.


End file.
